3star_recruit

I know all that. I also know that Louisville has a better roster this year, including a 7-1 center who was on the U17 US National team and an improved 6'8 forward who would be the best frontcourt player on our team. And Kentucky Wesleyan's 6'7 forward still cooked them. The young man's a former D-1 recruit who transferred down last year. Maybe he had a Conklin summer.

Turn out the better what? Passer? He's already the better passer. He's the only passing guard we have on this roster. Meadows is a combo guard that was brought in to take the reins so Medley wasn't forced to be our point guard on day one. It may take some time before Medley can actually score at this level.

Something tells me Kentucky Wesleyan is going to finish higher than 8th in its conference. Go Bills!

The NCAA Council voted to limit eligibility for two-time transfers to cut back on portal entrants. But that isn't what happened. Kids who wanted to transfer transferred anyway, and the NCAA has been forced to review a ton of waiver requests. Frankly, I think they are understaffed to handle this additional workload.

I'm beginning to wonder if the NCAA has cleared any international recruits who have needed a waiver in the last 4 months. Did they just take the summer off?

Somebody has to step into the sharpshooter role once Jimerson leaves. Would be nice if it's a guy already on the roster.

Cramps.

Goodwin is shooting roughly the same percentages from 2 and 3 in the NBA as he did as a senior in college. His biggest improvement has been in free throw shooting. In college, practice time is limited by student obligations. In the pros, you have access to shooting specialists and you can dedicate all day to practice if you want. NBA finishing school is good at turning 65% free throw shooters into 75% free throw shooters.

I need to know a lot more about the passing ability of this team before I could even hazard a guess at stats. Is this a 15 assists per game team or a 12 assists per game team?

No doubt. Goodwin knew where the ball was going, had like a 6'11 wingspan and huge hands. You need the genetics and the know-how to be a great rebounder.

Whether you believe it's skill or effort, mediocre rebounders don't all of a sudden become great rebounders. That kid has been doing it for years already.

You can commit to a style of play all you want. If you have a team full of mediocre defenders you just have guys getting exposed in pressing and trapping situations rather than in the half court. Against good offensive teams, it turns into a layup drill.

You need the personnel, i.e big guards who can really defend. We're lucky just to have bug guards that can score. Big guards who can do both are in short supply at the mid- major level.

Considering this team lost to an eventual top 15 team last year in the same manner that UTEP would, there isn't much difference.

Tonight our guys played a practice game against a mediocre team with a decent big. The only players on our team with a reputation for good defense are Hughes, Thames and Medley, a true freshman. None of our bigs played. We already knew our defense would be meh. Other than Jimerson and Parker going 1-9 from three, the game played out according to script. The incoming vets were solid but unspectacular. Medley was our best facilitator in his debut. The other guys did what we knew they were capable of. We shot free throws well. It's good to have Billiken basketball again. Onward and upward.

This team is built to shoot a high percentage from 3 at high volume.

We live in the information age. The only players on this team with a reputation for defense are Hughes, Thames and Medley. We will attempt to turn teams over but that's not really who these guys are. We're going to win games by making jump shots and taking care of the ball.

And even if a whale or two is paying some of Coach Ford's salary, that doesn't mean they're willing to switch that funding to players. Coach Ford's tenure will eventually end. Those whales are under no obligation to help pay for another coach. The need to pay players is never-ending.

I agree. You don't have unlimited time and manpower to build a war chest. What goal can you reasonably expect to accomplish in the next 6 months? Finding two new wealthy donors who can give you 100k a year? Or convincing two thousand middle class fans to give you $100 a piece? Of course your long-term goal is bring a two thousand new donors into the fold. But that may take years to do, not months. We've got transfers that we need to sign in a few months.

Of course you do it. It helps you better recruit against the likes of Rhode Island, who already has 400K in its NIL fund. I'm just pointing out who our true competition is. https://www.golocalprov.com/sports/uri-mens-basketball-hits-400000-for-nil-top-booster-and-former-cvs-ceo-says

So each year we raise 20K in 3 of those cities and 40K in Chicago. That still puts us in mid-major recruiting territory. We're not competing against Creighton or Marquette's sugar daddies with that.

Expand it to what? Where are these non-traditional high net worth individuals that love SLU basketball but aren't giving to the local basketball program?

The big schools have 500K to give to a top tier starter. 100K to give to a role player. For us, 50K for a player is a lot of money. We can be competitive in NIL, but only with schools that have a similar budget. And if a player becomes a star, we have no ability to match the offers he'll get in free agency. You just hope he chooses loyalty over money.

A direct link to the image should embed it automatically. At least that's how it working on my laptop:

Creighton has the Scott family, many Berkshire Hathaway multi-millionaires and occasionally Warren Buffett himself to support the athletic program. Gonzaga, on the other hand, may have to settle for lesser recruits than they've become accustomed to.